Liaison offers help carry Zero Deaths message

Brent Jennings, PE
Highway Safety Manager
The Idaho Transportation Department Office of Highway Safety is very grateful for the many diverse highway safety partners in engineering, enforcement, education and emergency medical services. One small, but powerful partnership is the Law Enforcement Liaisons.

What is a law enforcement liaison? A law enforcement liaison (LEL) is a police officer that provides expertise to the law enforcement community to engage them in highway safety grant program opportunities to maximize effective leadership, funding and programming. The Idaho LEL team is:

  • Officer Nick Knoll Coeur d’ Alene Police Department
  • Sgt. Ted Piche Lewiston Police Department
  • Officer Kyle Wills Boise Police Department
  • Lt. Kevin Haight Idaho State Police (Jerome)
  • Deputy Chad Morgan Bingham County Sheriff’s Department
  • Lt. Cameron Stanford Madison County Sheriff’s Department

Relationship-building should be a law enforcement agency’s single most important objective in its communication with the public. Progressive thinking law enforcement leaders have come to realize that it’s the officer on the street – the frontline of every agency – who represents the best in their profession and are best positioned to serve as ambassadors for the agency, their colleagues, and for highway safety programs.

The primary duties of the LEL is to educate law enforcement leaders on the need for priority attention to traffic safety issues and cooperative enforcement projects with other traffic safety disciplines. The LEL’s assume a leadership role in the promotion of traffic safety issues relating to the seat belt and impaired driving enforcement programs and in promoting the State law enforcement challenge with other law enforcement agencies.

The Law Enforcement Liaison program in Idaho is recognized as one of the best. Recently the Governor’s Highway Safety Association created a national Law Enforcement Liaison Director’s position and Idaho was mentioned as a program to emulate.

Our office appreciates the dedication of our Law Enforcement Liaisons and they serve the citizens well as we all move Towards Zero Deaths in Idaho.

Published 9-28-2012